unmade
by irresistible.revolution
Summary: In the old country they used to say vampires are but the corpses of the unburied dead, the wasteful and the criminal, the sinners and bastards, that revive with an unholy hunger for all that they lacked in life: love, family, a hearth to call their own. (Stefan lives a desolate existence, until a hybrid and a vitch cross his path). *Klefonnie AU*


_**A/N:** Happy birthday to my dear friend **thefudgeisgrumpy** , one of my favorite interlocutors, my twin bird, fellow dumb bitch, the Lestat to my Robert, who inspires me to be a better writer everyday. Ily girl! Hope this little slice of klefonnie is to your liking ^_^_

* * *

" _Desire, at the end, was malady, or a madness, or both. I grew careless of the lives of others, I took pleasure where it pleased me, and passed on. I forgot that every little action of the common day makes or unmakes character, and that therefore what one has done in the secret chamber one has someday to cry aloud on the house-tops." -_ Oscar Wilde

* * *

Stefan doesn't expect to be sold.

Shackled inside his cage, waiting for the Merchants to move him onstage where the wealthy patrons can cast their bids, he expects the exchange to be brief and unproductive, after which they'd either kill him or turn him loose into the forest where they'd caught him. The cages around him are filled with all manner of exotic supernaturals: rare Crescent wolves chained in silver and wolfsbane, Siphoners with their hands and mouths gagged, witches with dark magic flowing in their veins. The flesh markets of New Orleans no longer trafficked in human beings, but the bodies of the inhuman made for excellent slaves and pets.

His eyes squeeze shut against the blinding glare of candles as two attendants carry his cage and place him in view of the audience. He hasn't fed, not on human blood, since longer than he can remember. Beside the other captives in the menagerie he's a speck, worth less than dirt.

There's a hum and buzz of voices as the bidding begins. Stefan catches the glitter of silk and jewels, the flash of immortal eyes. The thick scent of blood and perfume and magic makes his eyes sting. The Dark Court of New Orleans, its blue-blooded vampire and werewolf and witch royalty, take his measure. Find him wanting.

One of the attendants poke him with a vervain-barbed stick, making him shudder and sink to his knees. His head hangs between his shoulders, waiting for Death. What he deserves, what he's craved for so long. Underneath that hunger and the fury, always an ending. A completion.

They're about to move his cage back into the wings when he hears a voice, clear and soft like a silver bell.

"Wait."

Stefan squints into the candlelit auditorium until he sees her. A small, brown-skinned vitch garbed in crimson silk, rubies in her hair and at her throat. Her eyes shine snake-green in the dark. As he watches, she leans close to her companion, a blond man dressed in black and silver, and murmurs something in his ear. The man's cheek dimples in a slow smile, and Stefan sees him wave a black-gloved hand at the attendants who rush to do his bidding.

"Sold!" the auctioneer declares, sealing his fate.

* * *

He's given a small room with black curtains to hide the sun.

His first night there a young man and woman slip in, hand in hand, and seemingly float to his bed. They're dressed head-to-toe in white with laurel in their hair, flushed with lifeblood that pulses beneath their smooth, young skin.

They kneel before him and hold out their arms so he can see the blue-green veins by the light of the moon. An ocean for his hunger to break open. Their eyes glow with supplication, waiting for his teeth.

He's so hungry he nearly groans, his fangs hatching painfully as the young couple seem to tremble in excitement.

With one last ounce of wavering strength, Stefan picks them up by their wrists and drags them to the door, hurling them out despite their protests. He bolts the door and slouches against it, hunger blackening his eyes, his tongue, his mouth. The Flesh Merchants fed their captives human blood diluted with liquor, but he'd abstained from drinking. He wanted to return to nature as best he could, live off the small scurrying animals that inhabited forests, melt into the world of beasts.

The last time had had human blood- the carmine memory fills his ears like a roaring sea as he collapses on the floor. Before the darkness of starvation closes in around him he tries to conjure her face, his reason for penance, his reason for-

 _Elena._

He tries to say her name.

Instead it's the vitch's face that floats above him like warm moon, her ruby lips pursed in displeasure, though her eyes are soft when she strokes his cheek, when she murmurs sweet words that lull him to sleep.

As he hears her whisper a name he thought long buried.

 _Ripper._

* * *

 _The Hunters took him outside Monterrey. He'd spent years feeding only on animals and those close to death, cultivating an existence of penitence. But it wasn't enough in the eyes of the Hunters who also fancied themselves priests. They believed they could cure him of his craving for blood, that all vampires could be similarly purged of sin and returned to Heaven's light. They chained him in a stone dungeon and fed him animal blood, mortified his flesh with vervain when he grew feral, fed him potions that amplified his pain._

 _It was a torturous existence, except for her._

 _Elena Gilbert was a daughter of Hunters and dreamed of being a nurse one day, all bright-eyed and bleeding heart. She reminded him of his youth, she was so vividly alive. She took pity on him and stole him small glasses of whiskey from her father's cabinet. She would slip in to see him in the early morning hours before she left for work when her father and brothers were asleep. She fed him liquor and sweetness. He would always remember her that way, with the fragile dawnlight across her face._

* * *

He isn't sure how long he's unconscious, but it feels like years. His skin is hardening , the veins shrivel from lack of sustenance. The next time he's awake he's being dragged down lamp-lit hallways by two vampires. His bleary eyes drink in the compound, the ancient stone walls and floors, the sharp glitter of crystal chandeliers, the heavy richness of Baroque art. A lavish mausoleum by all accounts, except for the vases full of fresh flowers, and distant smell of drying herbs. A vitch lives here too.

They bring him to a room full of blinding sunlight. His eyes squeeze close and he waits for the scorching pain, only to find that he's been placed in a shadowed corner. When his eyes adjust he sees that a skylight illuminates the center of the room, and in that pool of golden brilliance stands a small figure draped in red silk.

The vitch waits for his gaze to fall on her, and for the first time he's struck by the inviting innocence of her face, her quiet, crooked smile.

Then the silk slips from her shoulders and gold limns her naked body, soft and brown as a deer.

One of the vampires who'd brought him there forces his head down with an admonishment to keep his eyes on the ground. But the vitch utters a quiet command.

"No. Let him see."

* * *

 _In the end, they were discovered._

 _Elena had unclasped the last of his chains, poised to escape with him, when he heard her father's and brothers' footsteps in the distance rushing to intervene. He was too weak from months of their poison and deprivation to fight them. He needed blood, human blood, if he was to stand a chance._

* * *

There's a clink of chains and Stefan watches the young couple whose blood he'd rebuffed being lifted up above the witch. They're dangled above her from a wooden contraption similar to a gallows, upside down. Their faces are radiant with expectation.

The vitch pouts, hands on her hips as she surveys the room. "Nik, you're late," she says to her companion Stefan recognizes from the auction.

Nik joins her under the dangling bodies, discarding his own clothes as he does so. His body is unspeckled white, and redolent with immortality. Blood that never falters or dries up.

"I'm hungry," the vitch croons as Nik slides his arms around her.

"We can't have that, can we?" he murmurs, brushing his nose against hers. Stefan can only watch, mesmerized by tenderness, starving.

The witch gestures to one of the attending vampires and Stefan finds himself nearly carried forward and thrust at her feet. His skin begins scorching in the sun and he braces himself for a long onslaught of torture. The other vampires retreat and he feels the vitch's dainty hands on his shoulders, lifting him to his feet so he stands between her and her lover. She slips a ring on his finger and the burning mercifully ceases.

"Better?" she purrs.

Her slender fingers caress his face. It's almost a mother's tenderness. "I've always wanted you."

"Don't be greedy, love," Nik says behind him, and Stefan feels his hands descend, peeling off his clothes.

"You don't know me," Stefan replies at last, voice hoarse with hunger.

They only smile, and then the vitch raises her hand to the hanging bodies, makes a swift slicing motion in the air. Their throats open brightly, streaming red light.

* * *

 _Did he love her?_

 _Ah, who's to say._

 _She died without a whimper, tear-filled eyes shining until the very end, her blood tasting of escape._

 _By the time the Hunters reached the cell he was gone, fled on renewed vampire speed._

 _He took to the forests and hills and lived staggering among the animals and rocks. The long punishing months in the dungeon hadn't cured him of his hunger, but it had robbed him of something. Some heedless instinct, some joy. No matter how far he wondered he felt he carried that prison with him._

 _He would've liked to bury her himself, with her journals and her favorite necklace, her promises and her innocence._

 _In the old country they used to say vampires are but the corpses of the unburied dead, the wasteful and the criminal, the sinners and bastards, that revive with an unholy hunger for all that they lacked in life: love, family, a hearth to call their own._

 _Hunger, they said, is but another word for unbelonging._

* * *

Blood pours over them hot and rich and bubbling. The vitch sticks out her tongue, like a child catching snowflakes, and he sees the pearl gleam of her fangs. She bathes and drinks and licks the rivulets off his face. Behind him, her companion takes tender hold of his jaw, and Stefan feels his fingers trace his lips, coaxing them to part.

"Drink, sweetheart," Nik orders with sharp kisses to his ear.

Stefan looks up at sky, the bodies, the blood-stained sun. He tries but can't remember any other face, any other place before this. Before them. He's travelled so far to stand here under a red libation, in the arms of other monsters.

" _Ripper_ ," the vitch says softly. "Beautiful one, welcome home."

He opens his mouth.

* * *

 ** _A/N:_ **_Hope you guys enjoyed this little offering! I'm gonna go underground for a bit to finish up the update for "a case of you" as well as some other klonnie projects, so if I don't post anything for a little bit know that it's only cuz I'm, as always, working on more klonnie. I should hopefully have a couple things up for you guys before the end of the summer, fingers crossed. In the meantime, I'd love to hear your thoughts._

 _Oh, and if you're in the mood for more gothic klonnie do check out "Die as Lovers May" by the amazingly talented **wordsmithie** here on FFdotnet, and "Heavenly Bodies" by **elsac2** , and be sure to leave them some reviews! xoxox_


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